


You Can Close Your Eyes (and Forget You’re Alive)

by finkpishnets



Category: Bandom, Young Veins
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-22
Updated: 2010-06-22
Packaged: 2017-10-28 12:53:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/308076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/finkpishnets/pseuds/finkpishnets
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jon’s slumped in front of the TV in clothes he hasn’t changed for three days when Cassie says she’s leaving.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Can Close Your Eyes (and Forget You’re Alive)

**Author's Note:**

> Post-divorce fic.

Jon’s slumped in front of the TV in clothes he hasn’t changed for three days when Cassie says she’s leaving. She’s standing by the door, packed bags at her feet, watching him with sad eyes and she looks beautiful and heartbroken. When she whispers his name like a question, one last plea, he doesn’t say anything. He watches Dylan jump onto the coffee table and hears the door shut behind her.

There’s a dull ache in his chest, but he doesn’t move.

She’s made up her mind anyway.

 

+

 

He falls asleep on the couch to the sound of infomercials and wakes up twelve hours later to a voicemail message from Ryan quoting Jack Kerouac, a female voice that’s probably Z laughing in the background.

“ _Call me back, man,_ ” Ryan says before he hangs up. “ _Fucking seriously_.”

Jon saves it before turning over and closing his eyes; he doesn’t have anything better to do and sleeping’s as viable a choice as any. He replays Ryan’s voice in his head and dreams of orchards and open highways.

 

+

 

He takes about a thousand pictures of his cats and puts them all in a zip file he sends to Tom who’s somewhere on the road, and gets a text an hour later saying _Loser!!!!!!_ with a _You ok?_ attached to the end.

 _Cassie left_ , Jon replies and he only has to wait fifteen seconds before Tom’s calling him.

“Fuck,” Tom says.

It pretty much sums it up.

 

+

 

Jon sleeps and stares at the ceiling and sleeps, getting up every now and then to piss and feed the cats before falling back onto the couch and starting all over again. He doesn’t know how much time passes before there’s a knock at his door, soft at first and then a continuous pound when he tries to ignore it. He doesn’t get up, but whoever it is lets themself in anyway. Only four people who aren’t him or Cassie have a key to this place and he hasn’t spoken to two of them in months, so he’s pretty sure he knows who it is.

“Hi,” Ryan says, looking down at him awkwardly, as though he’s not quite sure what he’s doing here or what to say next. Ryan’s always sucked at the emotional sympathy thing, leaving it up to Spencer to mutter reassuring words and Brendon to use physical affection without regard for personal space, but now it’s just Jon and Ryan so awkward is about as good as it’s going to get.

“Hey,” Jon says, and his voice comes out gruff and scratchy from lack of use.

“I spoke to Tom.” And, yeah, okay that explained a lot.

“Huh,” Jon says, settling further back into the cushions and crossing his arms over his chest. His eyes fall shut, and he’s _tired_ despite the record amount he’s slept recently; he wonders whether this is what hibernation feels like. If so, it’s not all that bad.

“You stink,” Ryan tells him, and Jon can picture the way his nose is scrunched up even from behind closed eyes.

“If you don’t like it then you don’t have to stay.”

There’s a few moments of silence and Jon knows that Ryan’s considering it, considering leaving and calling someone else, passing the responsibility on. If this had been six months ago he wouldn’t have even paused, would have been on the phone immediately, shoving it into Jon’s hands when Spencer answered.

But it wasn’t six months ago and there wasn’t anyone for Ryan to call.

Ryan must have realized the same thing ‘cause a moment later he’s nudging Jon’s feet onto the floor and sitting down, looking off into space as if it holds all the answers.

Jon sighs and lets himself doze off.

 

+

 

He wakes up to the sound of something breaking followed by a muffled curse from the direction of the kitchen.

“Um,” Ryan says, leaning around the doorway, eyes wide. “I broke a plate.”

“What plate?” Jon asks.

“One of the red ones.”

“They were Cassie’s mom’s.”

“Shit,” Ryan says, looking apologetic. “Sorry.”

“S’ok,” Jon tells him. “I hate them anyway. Break them all if you want.”

Ryan watches him for a moment. “Right.”

“Right,” Jon repeats, staring back.

It’s Ryan who blinks first and he looks guilty again, though Jon’s pretty sure this time it’s not because of broken kitchenware.

 

+

 

They’re watching a _Law & Order_ marathon, one crime bleeding into another until none of the cases make much sense, when Ryan snaps.

“Seriously,” he says, and there’s the beginning of a snarl to his tone, the same one he’d use on Brendon when it was late and they were all exhausted and Brendon wouldn’t - _couldn’t_ \- sit still. It feels like forever since Jon’s heard it. “Seriously, you need to get up and take a fucking shower, and then you need to eat something with actual nutritional value.”

Jon watches Ryan’s hands curl into fists on his thighs, hears the frustration in his voice, but it’s the flash of worry in his eyes when he turns around that has Jon standing up and doing as he’s told.

He turns the water up high and stands under the spray until it runs cold, uses too much shampoo and only halfheartedly washes it out, flinches when it gets in his eyes. He feels cleaner, more human if not actually more alive, and he doesn’t get out until Ryan bangs on the door and asks if he’s drowned yet.

 

+

 

Ryan makes him stay awake until it’s dark out and then pushes him into the bedroom, stripping down the sheets and nudging Jon until he curls up under them. Jon’s so tired, used to days of nothing but falling in and out of sleep, and despite the weight of the duvet he feels cold in the double bed.

There’s a dip to his right and he cracks his eyes open enough to see Ryan kicking off his shoes before sliding under the covers, feet brushing Jon’s ankle as he gets comfortable.

Jon falls asleep feeling a whole lot warmer.

 

+

 

It’s not until he wakes up to sunlight streaming though a gap in the blinds, feeling rested for the first time in ages, that he realizes he hasn’t slept in the bed since Cassie left.

And that the first time he does is with Ryan curled up next to him, snoring softly into his pillow, arm flung across Jon’s chest like the most natural thing in the world.

It would be funny if it weren’t so terrifying.

 

+

 

( The thing is, Jon’s sort of been half in love with Ryan since the first time they met. Ryan had been ridiculously talented and ridiculously pretty and had introduced him to Spencer and Brendon and given him the chance to be in his band. He’d never done anything about it, never considered it, not really. He’d put it down to how grateful he was, managed to keep up a running stream of excuses inside his own head as the years went on that rang close enough to true to let him forget.

He still followed wherever Ryan led, though, and maybe that should have been his biggest clue that nothing had ever really changed.

Ryan’s still ridiculously talented and ridiculously pretty, only now Jon’s had years to learn him inside and out, to learn the good and the bad, and he’s more than a little worried that, whilst he was busy creating half-assed excuses as to why nothing could ever come of it, he was busy falling the rest of the way in love with the guy. )

 

+

 

Ryan eventually convinces him to leave the apartment. They only go as far as the grocery store down the street but it’s enough to make Jon dizzy, this reminder that just because _his_ world has shrunk to the inside of his own head doesn’t mean everyone else’s has. He stands in the breakfast aisle and watches a young child throwing a tantrum over Lucky Charms until his eyes start to water and he remembers to blink.

Ryan’s pushing the cart and throwing in everything that catches his eye; Jon’s pretty sure that none of it will constitute anything close to a meal, that he’ll end up with a cupboard full of brightly colored pasta sauces and imported French vinegars. For all his good intentions, Ryan has never been the most practical guy.

 _Ryan has never been the most practical guy_. And yet here he is, making sure that Jon doesn’t curl up in a ball and fade away and leave his cats tragically ownerless, and the realization’s enough to make him pause.

“Thanks,” he says, and his voice is too quiet but Ryan hears him anyway.

“For the hollandaise sauce? I didn’t know you even liked the stuff.”

“No,” he says. “For being here.”

Ryan looks up and gives him a small, sad smile.

“That’s what friends are for,” he says, but there’s something weird about it, something Jon doesn’t recognize. He lets it go anyway.

“And for the record,” he says eventually, “I _hate_ hollandaise sauce.”

Ryan throws back his head and laughs and for a moment all Jon can feel is relief.

 

+

 

It gets easier after that.

He doesn’t feel so tired all the time, and he actually answers the phone when his mom calls, trying his best to sound like he’s coping, and he hardly has to pretend at all. Ryan sits next to him the entire time, leg pressed gently against Jon’s, and it’s stupidly comforting. They play Scrabble and watch old episodes of _Project Runway_ so Ryan can mercilessly mock the contestants, and everything’s on the verge of being _normal_ again.

And then Cassie calls.

They’re in the kitchen, trying to work out how much pasta they need for two people, and Jon doesn’t make it to the phone before it switches to voicemail.

 _“Hey, I was just…I left some stuff behind? Some clothes and things. I was wondering when you’d be around so I could…so I can come and get them? I still have my key, so we can just arrange a time…”_

Jon feels detached for a moment, like he’s watching the way his body tenses up from a distance, and then there’s a hand on his arm – Ryan – pulling him back to the present, and he can’t decide whether to run for the phone or turn back to the kitchen when Ryan takes the decision out of his hands by kissing him.

Jon freezes.

Ryan stays pressed against him, lips pushed almost too hard against his own, and doesn’t move away until Cassie’s hung up.

“Don’t,” Ryan says, and his voice is rough, choked, like he’s just smoked a dozen cigarettes in a row.

“Don’t what?” Jon asks, and his own voice is nothing more than a whisper.

“Don’t fade away again.”

He looks scared, Jon realizes, but before he can say anything Ryan spins around and leaves, the apartment door slamming shut behind him, and Jon’s left wondering what the hell just happened.

 

+

 

For the first time in what feels like forever, Jon can’t sleep. His brain is too full and his body’s too wired and he just keeps tossing and turning until the blankets are twisted awkwardly around his legs and he has to kick them off altogether.

Finally, as the clock next to his bed blinks 3:45, he hears the soft click of the door opening, and Ryan’s feet shuffling almost silently across the floor.

“Hi,” Jon says, and his voice is too loud in the quiet room.

“Hi,” Ryan says, sounding awkward and guilty. He stays standing by the bottom of the bed, and part of Jon wants to reach out, pull him down so they’re side by side and just breathe until this tension starts to seem manageable again. He doesn’t; he just lays where he is and waits.

“You’re supposed to be the calm one,” Ryan says eventually, and Jon wants to roll his eyes, because _yeah_ , he’s heard that too many times before. “I mean, you’ve always made everything seem so _easy_ , like whatever happens it’ll be okay.”

Jon snorts, and it sounds ugly and bitter to his own ears. “Way to make it sound like I’m emotionally stunted,” he says, and he can see Ryan’s wince even by moonlight.

“That’s not…” Ryan sighs. “I _mean_ that ever since I met you, you’ve always seemed so in control, so content to just let the world keep turning and move with it at your own pace. I guess…I guess I selfishly thought that, even with everything that’s happened, that would stay the same.”

Jon doesn’t know what to say to that.

“I’m sorry,” Ryan says, and it’s so sincere, so unlike the Ryan who always skirts around the issue in a way that’s implied but never said. “I’m sorry you’re unhappy, and I’m sorry that everything in your life is falling apart, and I’m sorry that I made you choose.”

He looks so dejected, so remorseful, and Jon’s moving before he’s even really aware, kneeling up and scooting forward until his hands curl around Ryan’s shoulders.

“Ryan,” he says, tilting his head so he can look him in the eye. “You didn’t make me choose because it wasn’t a _choice_.”

“What?” Ryan says, his forehead wrinkling in confusion, and Jon shuts his eyes, tries to remember how to breathe.

“It wasn’t a choice, Ryan, because I’m pretty sure I’d follow you just about anywhere.” When he opens his eyes, he’s looking directly into Ryan’s, and he’s not sure what to make of the emotion behind them. “I mean, yeah,” he continues, “it _sucks_ that things didn’t work out, it sucks that we’re now RyanandJon and BrendonandSpencer and not one ridiculously co-dependant quartet. And I _miss_ them. I miss not getting random texts from Brendon at three in the morning, and I miss not having Spencer around to roll my eyes with when someone does something stupid, and I miss that we used to be a family and now we’re just two pairs who hardly talk.” He takes a deep breath. “But I don’t regret following you. I never have.”

The room’s silent for a while, and Jon starts to worry that he’s just made things worse. He’s about to apologize, lay back down and pretend none of this ever happened, but then Ryan’s leaning forward, his mouth pressing lightly against Jon’s, _too lightly_ , as if he’s still waiting for permission, and it only takes Jon three seconds before he’s tugging him closer, his fingers pressing harder into Ryan’s shoulders, and he’s pretty sure there’ll be bruises in the morning, but Ryan doesn’t seem to care if the way he’s arching into Jon’s touch is any indication.

“This is only going to make things more complicated,” Ryan says when they finally pull apart, and his voice is low and breathy, and it makes something warm and pleasant unfurl in Jon’s stomach to know it’s because of him.

“I know,” Jon says, but he’s leaning in for another kiss even as he does.

“I mean it,” Ryan says. “You’ve just come out of a relationship longer than most marriages, and I seem to be perpetually screwing over the people I care about. This can only end in disaster.”

Jon grins; it’s such a _relief_ to have the neurotic, pessimistic Ryan back.

“Probably,” he says, “but I’m pretty sure this is going to make it even harder to get rid of me.”

Ryan looks at him then, warm and happy even behind the unsure quirk of his mouth. “Welcome back,” he says, and he sounds as relieved as Jon feels. He smirks. “Feasibly only one of us could be a self-doubting mess anyway, and I totally have irrational and insecure down to an art. I think we should get back to _you_ keeping _me_ sane now. I liked that.”

Jon laughs, and it sounds strange, like he’s forgotten how and is only just beginning to remember. Ryan watches him fondly, and then shifts so he’s on the bed too, pushes at Jon’s chest until they’re both lying down, legs tangled and heads not quite reaching the pillows. He reaches for Jon’s hand and curls their fingers together.

“We’re going to be okay,” Ryan says after a while, and it sounds almost like a promise.

“I know,” Jon says, and for the first time in a long time he can feel himself starting to believe it.


End file.
